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Consumer Rights

I am sure that it is true in many, many cases, but the problem is that in this case it was not what happened to my constituent and his family. My constituent did not have that pleasurable experience, and ABTA seemed to have managed to wash its hands of any involvement, which to me is unacceptable. As I said, when the Minister wrote to me, he suggested that my constituents raise the issue with ABTA, but they have done so without any joy. He also pointed out the possible legal avenues open to my constituents, and indeed there are some, but just as in the case of my unfortunate constituents at Corinthian Quay, it is not so easy for individuals to make use of those rights. Particularly when it comes to package holidays, legislation is often complex and the consumer may not be able to pay for the legal backing to assert their claim against a powerful company that will want to exploit the complexity of the regulations to its advantage. There is a shortage of legal and other information resources to help consumers in their battles with those who have sold them faulty goods or offered poor services. A strong customer advocate needs to take up that role. From my experience with the bodies that do have that role to an extent—such as trading standards, which is excellent, if I may say so, at Edinburgh council, or Consumer Focus—it is not their role to be an advocate in respect of particular cases in the way that is needed to help consumers in the circumstances that I have described. Somebody needs to be encouraged and empowered to do that. Perhaps the way to deal with the issue is to give support to some of the non-governmental organisations to take up the role. Perhaps the Minister can address the issue in the consumer White Paper, which is expected shortly. He may be able to say something about that paper also when he replies to the debate. I cannot pretend that my final issue has any real connection with the previous two, but I would like to address it briefly as I have the Floor to do so. I am sure that hon. Members are familiar with what are called look-alike websites. Such a website appears to be from a governmental or other public agency, but in fact is not. It may be designed to mislead the consumer, the member of the public, into parting with money in some way or otherwise getting involved in something that the consumer did not wish to be involved in. Last year, I raised in questions with one of the Minister's colleagues an official-looking website to which a constituent had logged on and paid money to get a birth certificate. She paid more than twice as much as she would have if she had gone to the official website. She got her money back eventually, after a number of complaints. That company was not bogus: apparently, people would get their document if they paid the money. However, it was charging two or three times more for documents that were easily available from public websites or other public sources. There has been some publicity recently about credit advice websites—an issue on which I know the Office of Fair Trading has been active. Those websites give the impression of being linked to bodies such as Citizens Advice, other credit advice agencies or, indeed, Government Departments. I am pleased that the OFT has taken some action to try to deal with the websites in recent months. A website to which I want to draw attention today because it has recently been raised with me by one of my constituents represents itself as providing an opportunity for members of the public to obtain the European health insurance card—the EHIC. A website whose address, I believe, is www.ehic.org is one that people who do a search are referred to. People can go to that site and pay a much higher price than by going to the official NHS website. I draw attention to that case because it is one of many. I understand that the Government cannot totally control bogus or scam websites that are set up not necessarily from this country, but from many other parts of the world. However, the issue should be monitored closely. In relation to the website that was providing genuine Government certificates but at a higher price, the response that I received from Ministers here and from the Scottish Justice Minister, to whom the matter was also referred, was in effect that not much could be done about it. Although I accept that not much might be able to be done about it in many cases, the Government and Government agencies should be proactive in trying to monitor the growth of such websites. Where they can take action to shut them down, they should do so. Where proceedings can be taken against individuals who are misleading the public, they should do that. The Government should at least ensure that people cannot get documents through those websites, thereby driving the websites out of business. That concludes my tour of consumer affairs problems. They are all different, as I said, but they highlight the ways in which consumers can be misled and prevented from obtaining adequate redress. They emphasise the need for the excellent legislation introduced by the Government in this area to be accompanied by effective means of allowing the consumer to make use of it. I hope that by raising the subject today, I have not only highlighted cases affecting some of my constituents—I hope that the Minister will be able to investigate those in detail—but highlighted issues that need to be addressed, because we all know that when it comes to scams, shams, bogus websites and bogus activity, it is a moving target—we have to keep moving to try to catch up with what is going on. I hope that by drawing these matters to the House's attention today, I have contributed to the debate about how we can tackle these important issues.